Swelling and hardening of the neck muscles is often due to abnormal enlargement of the lymph nodes with or without pain, or some abnormal bulge for that matter. During the examination, the fingertip surface of one’s own hand can be used, in the order of anterior, posterior, superior and inferior. When you feel the swelling, you should pay attention to its surface skin color, shape, size, softness, hardness, amount and whether there is any pressure and pain. In this way, from what you touch and feel, you can make an initial understanding of it to decide whether or not to also ask the doctor for further diagnosis and treatment. Because the subcutaneous tissue in the neck is small and thin, it is easy to detect a lump. When you wash your face or take a bath, feel your neck in passing and often perform self-examination, so that once you find any abnormalities, you can achieve the purpose of early detection, early diagnosis and early treatment. There are many reasons for the swelling and hardening of the neck muscles, and they should be judged according to their shape, the characteristics of their occurrence and growth, and the general condition of the body. When you feel one or several oval-shaped, slightly hard, similar to the hardness of the tip of your own nose, smooth surface, movable in all directions, of different sizes and with slight pressure pain on both sides of your own jaw and chin or neck, you should mostly consider the swelling of lymph nodes in these areas as a result. Common diseases are inflammation of the mouth, inflammation of the throat, cold, fever, etc. If its external skin then has obvious sensations of redness, swelling, heat and pain, it is mostly acute lymphadenitis. The appearance of this condition is mostly a protective function of the body. This is because when you have an inflammatory reaction in your mouth, throat, etc., some lymphocytes in the lymph nodes begin to fight with the inflammatory cells, and after killing those inflammatory cells in large numbers, the lymph nodes become enlarged. Often, after the inflammatory reaction is controlled, such as taking anti-inflammatory drugs, these swollen lymph nodes will then become smaller and return to normal, and you will find that they are gone. If you feel the lymph nodes without pain, and they become bigger day by day, or even have broken down inside the skin, so that scars form on the surface of the skin, and they feel like hollow underneath from the outside, like pressing onion tubes, and spread continuously, like digging a tunnel. This is often lymphatic tuberculosis, which is difficult to cure and is more common in children, but rarely occurs in adults. Ancestral medicine noticed this disease thousands of years ago and named it scrofula. It is mostly caused by liver qi stagnation and long depression turning into fire, so that the refined liquid becomes phlegm and rises and knots in the neck. When you feel a single lump with clear border, smooth surface and moving up and down with swallowing action on both sides of the trachea at the front of the neck, it is mostly a thyroid adenoma. If you find an enlarged thyroid gland with hard texture and uneven surface on only one side, you should be alert to the occurrence of thyroid cancer. If you also feel enlarged lymph nodes in the vicinity such as under the jaw, you should suspect thyroid cancer more and need to go to the hospital for pathological examination immediately.